Pentagon ran a secret multimillion dollar UFO programme
According to a New York Times report, the Pentagon has been running a secret multimillion dollar programme to investigate Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs). The programme, which began in 2007 and was reportedly closed in 2012, was known to very few officials. Called the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Programme (AATIP), it cost the US Department of Defense $22 million before it was shut down.
A brief history of UFO investigations in the US
The Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Programme was far from the first one to look into UFOs. 1947 onwards, the US Air Force began a series of studies which investigated over 12,000 UFO sightings. A programme, code-named Project Blue Book, which ran from 1952-1969, concluded that most of the sightings involved stars, clouds, and different forms of aircraft. 701 sightings, however, remained unexplained.
Details about the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Programme
The AATIP was the brainchild of retired Democratic senator Harry Reid who was the Senate majority leader at the time. Most of the funding for secret programme, parts of which still remain classified, went to an aerospace research company run by a Reid's billionaire entrepreneur friend, Robert Bigelow. Bigelow, who is currently working with NASA, is "absolutely convinced" of alien life having visited Earth.
Video footage from military aircraft shows strange unidentified flying objects
Officials associated with AATIP said that videos of encounters between unidentified objects and American military aircraft had been studied. One incident involved a video two Navy F/A-18 fighter jets chasing an oval whitish object the size of a commercial airplane off the coast of San Diego in 2004. Another video included footage from a F/A-18 showing a rotating aircraft surrounded by a glowing aura.
What the research into UFOs entailed
Robert Bigelow's company, Bigelow Airspace, received most of the programme funding. Using the same, Bigelow Airspace hired subcontractors and carried out research. Several buildings in Las Vegas were modified to store metal alloys and other materials recovered from unidentified aerial phenomena. Researchers also studied people who claimed to have experienced physical effects from UFO encounters to try and observe physiological changes.
Senator Reid's call to designate AATIP as top secret
By 2009, Senator Reid was convinced that the findings of the programme were extraordinary enough for AATIP to be designated as a "restricted special access programme". A 2009 Pentagon briefing summary prepared by the director of AATIP asserted that "what was considered science fiction is now science fact", and that the US was incapable of defending itself against some of the technologies discovered.
The current status of UFO research
The Pentagon ended funding the programme because it deemed that other high priority issues merited funding. However, Luis Elizondo, who ran the programme, said that despite lack of government funding, investigations continued well beyond 2012. Elizondo, who resigned from the Pentagon in October, now co-runs the To the Stars Academy of Arts and Science which is bent towards UFO research.
